


Let Me

by kho



Category: Bates Motel (2013)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-07
Updated: 2016-03-07
Packaged: 2018-05-25 09:04:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6188443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kho/pseuds/kho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He opens the door to her sobbing and even as angry as she can make him as tired as he is of being lied to, as done with this bullshit as he tries to convince himself he is, he still just wants to dry her tears and make her whole.   (set near the end of season 3)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Me

It isn't a knock so much as a fury of fists against his door.  A pounding, an asskicking of the entirety of his door.  It would be alarming except for the fact that this could only be one person, and while she did terrify him for a multitude of reasons, fearing for his safety was not one of them. 

He opens the door to her sobbing and even as angry as she can make him as tired as he is of being lied to, as done with this bullshit as he tries to convince himself he is, he still just wants to dry her tears and make her whole.   "Norma?" 

She gasps on her tears and it shatters his heart every time she does it but before he can ask what's wrong she steps into him and fists her hands in his shirt and buries her head in his neck.  He lifts his arms and holds her to him tight, threading his hand into her hair. 

"Please," she begs, her lips against his neck.  He closes his eyes and smells her hair. "Please don't ask me questions. Please stop.  I can't. I just want to not think about it for one night.  Can't you just, please? For one night?"

"Norma."

"I only feel safe when I'm with you. I just want to feel safe and not think anymore."  Her hand slides down his chest as she pulls back and looks at him.  Her eyes are wet and red rimmed, mouth pursed, ready to spit a thousand curses at him if he argues at all and it makes him smile.  She blinks and shakes her head. "The hell are you smiling at?"

"You are so infuriating," he says gently, framing her face in his hands and smiling down at her.  "I swear to God I hate you."

She blinks up at him and smiles back, confused and a mess and ten kinds of crazy, and the last person he should be falling in love with.  "I hate you too, ya jerk."

"You are safe here, Norma.  I want you to always feel safe with me," he says, wiping away a tear with his thumb.  "I will always protect you, but you have to let me."

She closes her eyes.  "Alex."

"I'm not asking tonight," he whispers, pulling her forward and to the side, kicking out to shut the door behind her.  "I'm not asking any questions, I just want you to understand that I cannot keep you safe, I cannot keep you and Norman safe, if you are not honest with me.”  He lifts her chin until she opens her eyes to look at him.  “Do you get that that’s all I want? Is to protect you?  I can’t do that if I don’t know what’s happening.”

“I can’t trust anyone, Alex,” she says, another tear falling.  He leans forward and kisses it off of her face, rests his forehead against hers.  “Everyone I have ever trusted has betrayed me, fucked me over, left me.  Alex I want to trust you.  I trust you more than I do most anyone else.  I trust you more than I should.”

“Trust me, Norma,” he says, and it’s too soon.  She’s too fragile and she’s too wounded and she’s too fucking crazy for him to be honest.  For him to say I love you.  For him to tell her he’s loved her for months.  He doesn’t do this, he doesn’t fall for women like this.  This pining, heart pounding in his ears, will take all of you and all of your bullshit too if it just means he gets to have you, kind of way.  He doesn’t fall for the crazy, unpredictable, flighty, out of control ones for damn sure.  But Norma, Norma is something different.  Something special, and unique, and he’s fallen for her so completely that his own sanity suffers for it.  “You can trust me, you should trust me.  I will always protect you.”

“Alex, please,” she breathes against his cheek and he turns his face towards her and kisses her, because maybe words just won’t do it.  Maybe she can’t hear him.  Maybe she’s been lied to so much she can’t separate the truth from the lies anymore.

So his hands cupping her cheeks, thumbs wiping her eyes dry, he kisses her and pours every ounce of himself into the kiss even as she stiffens against him.  He kisses her and tries to say trust me, trust in me, I won’t lie to you, I won’t betray you, I will protect you.  I will keep you safe forever if you’ll let me.

And the thing is, he knows.  He knows she wants him too.  He knows, so when normally he’d pull away when she went stiff against him and pushed at him, he stayed.  He held her there and pressed his lips to hers, and just breathed her in and waited for her to exhale.

He feels her fingers clenched in his shirt finally relax, spread across his chest as she finally kisses him back.  He lowers one arm to fold around the small of her back to haul her up against him and opens his mouth to hers and when she answers just as eagerly he knows he’s done.  He’s finished.  He’s tumbling head over heels and falling down into the deep pit of darkness that is Norma Bates’ world, because he was already half in it but now that he knows what she tastes like he’ll never be able to make himself crawl out of it.

“Let me,” he says against her mouth, walking backwards toward his bedroom.

She follows and hangs onto his shirt, says, “I want to.”

He turns her towards his bed and gently lowers her on top of it, crawling on top of her.  “Let me in,” he says, and he doesn’t mean inside her, he means inside of all of her.  Inside her world, inside of her life, inside of her head, inside of her heart.

She looks up at him and raises a hand and brushes her thumb over his cheek as she slides her fingers back into his hair.  “I’m trying.”

“Try harder,” he says, lowering himself on top of her and sliding a hand down her waist and over her hip and down to her thigh.  He lets it travel back up again.  “Stop pushing me away.”

Her fingers curl behind his neck and pull him down the rest of the way, her breath ghosting over his lips as she winds a leg around his leg to hold him down.  She looks up searchingly into his eyes smiles the tiniest of smiles, and says, “Okay.”


End file.
